Tuesday, 3 January 2012

NEW YORK I LOVE YOU: PT 1

Warning, this will
be image and word heavy but finally getting around to posting about my
trip to NYC in November. The main purpose of the trip was to support my
Mum running the marathon (her 5th marathon, but 1st in NYC) but it
nicely coincided with my 30th birthday. I did A LOT of research before I
left and luckily my new assistant who started only a month before my
trip, lived in NYC for 3 months, so I had some great recommendations!

The
first night, we headed straight out to dinner on foot, hoping to
stumble across somewhere in the East Village. When it quickly became
apparent that just trying to stumble doesn't really work on your first
night in a big city I decided to head towards one of my recommendations,
Pulino's, sister restaurant of
Pastis. It did not disappoint and there we ate probably the best pizza I
have ever eaten (and I might as well say now, this post is going to be
full of "the best...I've ever eaten" quotes).

We stayed in a no frills hotel on East 28th and just up the road (corner of East 28th and 5th)
we found Café 28 which was to become our staple breakfast haunt. Can’t
go wrong with anywhere you can get pancakes with a side of bacon, a
vanilla coffee and change from a ten dollar bill IMHO!

That
morning we did the ‘tourist thing’ and sought out Times Square (smaller
than expected), Central Park (even better than expected), Macy’s and
The Met before heading to Expo where my Mum collected her race number, I
went all paparazzi and we all tried several flavours of Gatorade in
preparation for Mum’s big race.

We ended the day with a walk along The Highline and a wander through Chelsea Market and the Meatpacking District where we spotted Anna Selezneva having a cigarette outside Pastis.

If
you've never heard of it, The Highline is a public park built on an old
elevated trainline and after being in New York just a day it was a
welcome retreat from being at ground level where you can rarely see the
sky.

On day two we headed
to the 9/11 Museum and passed the Occupy Wall Street protests where I
was interested to stop and listen and read a few of the notices.

I have to admit I’m
still not sure where I stand on all of that, but this wasn’t meant to be
a political blog, so on to the shopping…

Lower
East Side next where we found Pixie Market (SO TINY!!) and lots of cool
little boutiques on Ludlow Street (sadly The Reformation was closed).

..and
then on to the East Village for hot dogs at Crif Dogs! Yes possibly one
of the best hot dogs I've ever eaten!! I had the Chilli Dog and my
sister and Mum went for the BLT Dog, both amazing. The best thing about
this place (and there are so many great things about it, the interior
reminded me of Wayne's World in a good way) is the old fashioned
telephone booth in the corner, which when you lift the receiver gives
access to the secret bar, PDT.

Viki and I then sought out Opening Ceremony, Topshop (just to compare, oh my goodness America you are being ripped off), Daves QualityMeat, Love Adorned, LF Stores, Beacons Closet.. to name a few. Dinner was La Esquina for amazing margheritas and Mexican.

We discovered the best stall
at Brooklyn Flea and I purchased an amazing sequin top after having a
long chat about my Mum with the lady on the stall. One of my favourite
things about New York – everyone wants to have a conversation.

Later the whole
family went to Little Italy for pasta since my Mum needed to carb load the night before the marathon. We thought it might be overrated and gimmicky but the food was
excellent and authentic.